The present invention relates to a reaction vessel for carrying out reactions which sequentially produce thiazolinon amino acid derivatives in an analyzer which automate amino-terminal sequence analysis of protein or peptide.
FIGS. 6 and 7 show two types of conventional reaction vessel for carrying out reactions which sequentially produce thiazolinon amino acid derivatives based on the Edman reaction.
The conventional reaction vessel of FIG. 6 is constructed such that a sample is adsorbed in a glass filter 31 on a membrane filter 30 sandwiched by a pair of glass blocks 29a and 29b within a frame 28, and a reagent or solvent is fed to the sample through a flow path in the center of the glass blocks.
The other conventional reaction vessel shown in FIG. 7 comprises a reaction chamber 34 connected to a vacuum pump 32 and to a nitrogen gas bottle 33 through a three-way switch valve 31 to create a vacuum in the reaction chamber or to fill the reaction chamber with nitrogen gas. The reaction chamber 34 is composed of a glass cup 36 which is rotatable by a motor 35, a supply line 37 for feeding reagent and solvent needed for reaction, into the glass cup 36 and a discharge line 38 for removing the reagent and solvent.
However, with regard to the FIG. 6 conventional reaction vessel, the sample is supported between glass fibers of the glass filter 30 and therefore the reagent or solvent cannot be efficiently distributed. Hence the reactions become nonuniform. Thereby repeatitive yield in the sequence analysis is reduced. Such tendency becomes remarkable in the case of a micro amount of sample to thereby make the analysis not possible. Further, various kinds of reagents and solvents are supplied through a common flow path to the protein sample for the reaction. Therefore, these substances may be contaminated by each other.
With regard to the FIG. 7 conventional reaction vessel, the structure for rotation of the sample is contained in the vacuum chamber. Therefore the maintenance of the analyzer is complicated. In particular, because the glass cup for treating a micro amount of the sample is small, it is difficult to maintain the stable rotation of such a small glass cup.